Animal Equality reveals the hidden sadism and brutality on a pig farm in Murcia (Spain). These new and shocking images show the exploitation endured by animals in the meat industry.

The international animal rights organisation Animal Equality has just released a shocking video with images filmed at a pig farm in El Escobar, located in Fuente Alamo in the Spanish region of Murcia. The video shows some of the most brutal scenes of violence against animals at farms that our Investigation Team has ever witnessed. Animal Equality has pressed charges against the farm owner and workers.

Marcos Verduga Vinicio, one of the farm workers who has handed over the footage, has revealed that the animals are bred for the food company El Pozo, which also sells its products to the leading supermarket, Morrisons in the United Kingdom and in other countries. In 2010, the United Kingdom imported 16,253 tonnes of pig flesh from Spain, including products such as 'chorizo' from this company. In 2008 this farm received a ‘Porc d'Or award’[1] from the meat industry.

Animal Equality has obtained footage of the following:

Workers hitting pigs on their heads with iron bars, jumping on top of them, kicking them, and posing in front of a camera with the pigs

Workers attacking and killing pigs with meter-in-length swords

The hitting of a pregnant pig with a bar before cutting her abdomen and uterus with a knife whilst she's still conscious, then pulling of piglets out of her uterus and killing her because she isn’t fit for the slaughterhouse

This pig, tied and immobilised, unsuccessfully tries to escape while the workers for several minutes pulls out the piglets. They remove her intestines, liver and other internal organs while she suffers terribly. The animal is left in agony with internal organs spread over the ground until she dies several minutes later

Andrew Knight, Veterinarian and Fellow of the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics states:"The treatment of these pigs was the most egregious abuse of individual farm animals that I have ever observed. The workers clearly appeared to delight in some of their actions. The treatment of these pigs was shockingly cruel, and in fact, sadistic."

Miguel Rodriguez Castaño, Anaesthetic of the Veterinary Hospital of the University of Madrid, states: "This is the most horrible treatment of animals I've seen in my career. The suffering these animals have to endure is similar to the suffering humans would experience in that same situation. The animals have endured extreme suffering and unique brutality."

Thanks to Marcos Verduga Vinicio, Animal Equality has found that these events occur frequently on the farm El Escobar owned by Francisco Vera Sanchez, and that the farm managers are aware of this. In fact it is they who request these actions, have been filmed engaging in them, and have established these methods as the norm for killing animals at the farm.

In a unique interview given to Animal Equality, this worker states that he has witnessed the killing of pigs withswordsmore than50 times already. He adds that this type of abuse occurs on a regular basis - each week since he started working at the farm in 2009.

Animal Equality regards these scenes of violence (the most recent being filmed just three weeks ago) as examples of sadistic behavior against animals.

This case shows once again the horror inflicted onto the animals used in the meat industry. A previous investigation by Animal Equality that took place for over two years at 172 farms highlighted the horror of Spanish pig farming industry. The findings of this investigation can be viewed at: http://vimeo.com/13122374

Worldwide reputable entities such as the Academics of Nutrition and Dietitians of USA[2], and their counterparts in Canada[3] and New Zealand[4], state that a vegan diet –without animal products– can provide all required nutrients. Therefore, Animal Equality encourages the public to choose a vegan lifestyle, free from animal products and exploitation, and enjoy our food respecting animal rights and without supporting violence against them.

Animal Equality works to raise public awareness of the suffering and death of non-human animals in our society and calls for the abolition of animal use. Animals are sentient beings able to feel emotions and sensations such as pain, pleasure or stress and like us they are individuals with their own needs and an interest in living. Most people believe that animals should not be harmed unnecessarily, but the consumption of animal products forces animals into a life of misery and an untimely death. Without the public demand for animal products, billions of sentient beings would be able to live their life, as they have the right to do so, without misery and exploitation.

Replies to This Discussion

Horrendous. It supports my suspicion that people who work in slaughterhouses have to be psychologically damaged to work there. Pigs seem to be targeted for particular brutality which I'm not quite sure why that is. I think they are wonderful animals but I guess there is a lot of cultural association of pigs to unsavory elements. I do however appreciate that these people who expose the cruelty are so courageous. It must be torture for them to have to witness what goes on.

The article said 'could' constitute animal abuse and result in up to one years imprisonment. Does not somehow seem adequate. I suspect a burglar would get more. These trivial sentences are frustrating and I suspect that only when laws start to recognise animal rights by the severity of the punishment will people start to perhaps get it that animals matter.

This is the second undercover expose from Animal Equality this year. I am slightly confused because I thought that AE didn't concentrate on the horror and abuses on *individual* farms but more that *all* farms were the same. No such thing as humane in farming, fishing, dairy and egg industries et al. The horror that these individuals had to go through is horrendous, I am not for *one* minute diminishing their suffering and murders, just wondering if this is the route that AE is now taking? Does anyone know? I did comment on a post they put up but the whole thread was removed.

Hi Roger,It was because of the undercover exposes, both on pig farms, I haven't seen any other undercover work from them of this nature. I also noticed last year that they did some Peta-esque style demonstrations (in a state of undress) which again surprised me somewhat. Maybe it's not a shift, but a move in a new direction for them? I do still support them as I think they are one of the best organisations around who do give the very important message that to live vegan is *the* way forward and to help individuals. Today they discussed the Iowa state gag, which again surprised me, concentrating on single issue campaigns, rather then in farming in general. For me, concentration on *one* specific farm and the gag order in that state I am unsure of how this is effective? Exposing individual farms may close down that farm, or make that farm make changes, but how will this help the animals' in the long run? They are still bred for slaughter and they will still suffer. This is where, for me, it becomes bordering on humane/welfare as opposed to the end of use. People could just go elsewhere, thinking it is *a* particular farm.

Roger Yates said:

Hi vintagelovingvegan.

I believe that AE's claims-making is always vegan-based and anti-speciesists, meaning that they always contextualise individual cases within animal use as a general matter.

Do you detect a shift - and where?

vintagelovingvegan said:

This is the second undercover expose from Animal Equality this year. I am slightly confused because I thought that AE didn't concentrate on the horror and abuses on *individual* farms but more that *all* farms were the same. No such thing as humane in farming, fishing, dairy and egg industries et al. The horror that these individuals had to go through is horrendous, I am not for *one* minute diminishing their suffering and murders, just wondering if this is the route that AE is now taking? Does anyone know? I did comment on a post they put up but the whole thread was removed.

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